Mere possession or cultivation over the land for a long time not sufficient for Kudivaram right.

D. Raju, J.

These appeals have been filed under Sec.30 of the Tamil Nadu Minor lnams (Abolition and Conversion into Ryotwari) Act, 1963, Tamil Nadu Act 30 of 1963, (hereinafter referred to as “the Act”), against the orders of the Inam Estates Abolition Tribunal (Subordinate Judge), Thanjavur, wherein the tribunal below has chosen to reverse the orders passed by the Assistant Settlement Officer, Thanjavur, granting patta in favour of the appellants or their predecessors-in-interest under Sec.8(1) of the Act Though in the individual appeals, the factual details may vary and differ, in some respects or other, the overall submissions made in all these appeals, overlap and virtually certain common points have been raised in the appeals, though the learned counsel appearing for the respondents in some of the cases pointed out one or the other additional factual details or points as going further to support the case of the respective respondents.

.2. Mr.K.Srinivasan, learned counsel appearing for the appellants instructed by Mr.Satish Parasaran, contended that the Tribunal below committed a serious error of law as also of fact in reversing the orders of the Assistant Settlement Officer, Thanjavur. The submission of the learned counsel for the appellants is that the tribunal below failed to keep into account the principles laid down by the Privy Council in the decision in Lakshmanna v. Venkateswarlu, (1949)2 M.L.J. 500, and on this ground alone, the orders of the tribunal are liable to be set aside. That was a case wherein the holder of a minor inam appears to have filed a suit to eject the tenants from their respective holding and their Lordships of the Privy Council held in that context that the burden is on the plaintiff to make out a right to evict by proving that the grant included both melwaram and kudiwaram interest or that the tenants or their predecessors were let into possession by the inamdar under a terminable lease and, where the evidence is not conclusive, the suit must fail as the burden on the plaintiff is not discharged. In our view, the said decision will have no relevance or application to the cases on hand, for the reasons, that the proceedings before us have not emanated out of a suit before a civil court, that the proceedings before us do not concern with the right of the inamdar to eject a tenant under him under law prior to the abolition of the inam and the introduction of ryotwari settlement in the area and that further for the fact that in the proceedings before us. we have to concern ourselves and consider the competing claims asserted for the grant of patta under a special enactment by finding out the existence or otherwise of the necessary eligibility criteria for allowing patta to either of the parties before us.

3. The learned counsel for the appellants further contended that the tribunal below failed to see in the appeals before it that the respondents-claimants have not proved that they are entitled to kudiwaram interest or for that respect, both warams in the lands in question. There is no dispute by the appellants that they do not hold or claim to have held melwaram interest in the lands and that what they assert is not even, in our view, a claim that they were grantees of kudiwaram. interest. But, their claim is on the basis of the alleged defect in the proof of the claim projected by the respondents. In substance, the appellants claim that as long as the respondents an their predecessors-in-interest have not shown to have acquired or held or shown to be entitled to both warams, namely, kudiwaram as well as melwaram interest in the lands, the appellants and their predecessors-in-interest as persons in continuous possession and occupation of the lands are entitled to patta under the provisions of the Act and the grant of patta made in their favour by the Assistant Settlement Officer in recognition of their rights by virtue of their possession and cultivation of the lands in question shoul